Posted
by
samzenpus
on Thursday June 03, 2010 @12:10PM
from the no-centaurs-allowed dept.

An anonymous reader writes "The sci-fi movie Splice seems to have scared the Ohio's State Senator Steve Buehrer. The Ohio Senate has passed Sen. Buehrer's bill banning 'the creation, transportation, or receipt of a human-animal hybrid, the transfer of a nonhuman embryo into a human womb, and the transfer of a human embryo into a nonhuman womb.' So much for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles."

I guess it just goes to show how quickly a field is progressing when 2/3 of the comments on a slashdot story ignorantly assume it's still science fiction and couldn't possibly require legislation.
However, I hope this is defined very carefully not to preclude important medical research. Growing a human ear on a mouse [pbs.org], for example, might seem like a gross waste of time, but perhaps not if you're a soldier whose soft tissue was burned off by an IED. (That image is from way back in 1997 BTW).

From the looks of it, they bill is pretty specific in discussing hybrid embryos, and it specifically allows "(1) Research involving the use of transgenic animal models containing human genes;" and "(2) Xenotransplantation of human organs, tissues, or cells into recipient animals, including animals at any stage of development prior to birth, so long as the xenotransplantation does not violate a prohibition in divisio

Here is another article [slate.com] with several links. Quoting: "We've derived stem cells by inserting human genomes in rabbit eggs. We've made mice with human prostate glands. We've made sheep with nearly half-human livers. This week, Britain's Academy of Medical Sciences reported (PDF) that scientists have created "thousands of examples of transgenic animals" carrying human DNA. According to the report, "the introduction of human gene sequences into mouse cells in vitro is a technique now practiced in virtually eve

Their not ignorant. The OP is ignorant. While there may be research being done, there are NOT animal-human hybrids, nor are there likely to be for some time. They may be splicing bits here and here, like the growing of the human ear on the mouse, but the mouse ITSELF is not a hybrid. There are NOT hybrid animals running around!

Besides, with the creation of synthetic genomes recently, wouldn't scientists just create a human or animal genome to splice with the other? If they were doing this they'd only be looking for a small section of a particular species genome to splice with a humans, so synthesizing it wouldn't be too difficult*. At that point, they are only inserting synthetic genes and, while they are violating the spirit of the law, I seriously doubt they would be violating the letter.

It is incredibly important to establish whether something is wrong before you start banning it, otherwise you'll be on a bullet train to tyranny.

If you are being truthful when you say you're 'not in a position intellectually to say what is or is not best for society' please stop voting immediately if you haven't already. We have enough people who don't know anything about history or anything about ethics changing the course of political events based on knee-jerk ideology at best and their opinion of who is more visually attractive at worst that we don't need people who could otherwise self-select themselves out adding to the problem.

I had a history professor of whom I was quite fond say once that he hated democracy because he knew that his well-informed, well-reasoned choice could be blotted out in a second by the near-random opinion of his cretinous neighbor. The older I get and the more I read the more inclined I am to agree.

Looking at the bill, it appears to me to be crafted to not affect things like animal tissue transplants, but whether or not it may inadvertantly affect some other currently accepted practice I can't say (as I'm neither an expert at the nuances of legalese, nor an expert in the terminology and possibilities of medical sciences).

No. The manipulation has to be done at the level of one of these (quick summary): embryonic "fusing" or engineering; engineering non-humans to produce human gametes; or using any human neural tissue at all in an animal (animal-to-human brain-matter transplants are OK).

this isn't silly at all. if it wasn't made illegal, a lot of pretty sick things would be done openly pretty quickly. I guess lots of sick things can happen in underground labs either way (urrrgh), but the scale would be vastly different.

I agree with you, this is far from a 'silly' law that has no real impact. This is in fact a completely misguided fear-driven law that will eliminate research into a promising technology because of some poorly defined moral yuck-factor.

Kinda like the eight year delay in embryonic stem cell research, but that has got to make some voting group pretty happy. I just can't wait to see if their opinion changes when they are on an organ donor waiting list.

Right, so the one problem with xenografts is that the animal genetics are so different that they produce a massive immune response. But suppose we take say pigs and introduce human genes through genetic modification. Theoretically you could create a pig with genetics close enough to a human to not produce as much of an immune response. (Closer to a human-human transplant.) Why we would want to completely ban this idea when we would hopefully be able to use it to grow organs for everybody who needs one is be

And dead goes a decade or more of research on growing genetic identical replacement organs and tissue for transplant. The intermediate step to growing these things in a lab is growing them in an animal while the perfect the technique. No hybrid' the research stops dead. I wish legislators would stop looking at SciFi scare movies and actually start talking to real scientists in the field in question on what is going on, what the benefits could be and what the risks are. As it is they get their information fr

What if someone pulled this off and made a Lola Bunny clone, but for real? Think about it for a second. With a functional human brain and supporting systems, it--sorry, she--would definitely be sentient... and intelligent... and capable of survival. But the genome would be different, and the physical form would be as well. The skeletal structure may be largely similar to a human's-- especially the pelvic and spinal structures, allowing fully upright bip

Well, I think the existing rules are clear enough. A human is conceived via sex between a man and a woman. Anything else isn't human, doesn't have human rights.

Yes, and that in itself is a huge problem. At a time, we didn't consider black people to have rights. At a time in a country, Jews didn't have rights. At times in various countries, non-nationals didn't have rights.

If at any time in the future we encounter something that can be described as a "person" (i.e. an alien race or a human artificial life with capacity for human-like thought and feeling), there will be a huge political battle over the establishment of rights for said beings.

You know... there was a time when I would have thought this bill was a no-brainer and should be passed in every country. But recently, reading the Hyperion 4 part series by Dan Simmons changed my mind about that. Well, it at least got me thinking a little deeper about this.

The law does not define what is human, other then by the generic description of "homo sapiens" How about a fully artificial set of chromosomes from a computer database created in a lab? Without a VERY clear definition of human, that we currently don't have, these type of laws are useless. Is someone with downs syndrome human? they have a extra whole chromosome. How about someone who gets infected with a retrovirus. They now have a mix of human and virus DNA. How about people who are XXY, XXYY, XYY or other

No, the law isn't useless. Chromosomal abnormalities don't make one non-human; there is no debate about this. Humans with retroviral manipulation at the level we have, are still human (and note this isn't banned by the bill). Yes, we share a lot of DNA, but it's still totally trivial to distinguish us at the genetic level. The law's interpretation today, and for the next few decades, is extremely clear. Every law has "flaws" at the level you are describing. That's why they get amended.

While it is probably not yet possible to create a breeding animal-human hybrid, the idea should be considered seriously. There are numerous implications for society as a whole. Would such a person be treated a sub-class without rights? What purpose would they have?

Science fiction writers, as is the norm, have dealt with such issues for many years, exploring various outcomes, both good and bad.

Yes, the stories are science fiction. However, science fiction isn't just test tubes and electronics. It is the interaction of people in a futuristic environment. Consider the fact that 30 years ago, no one thought it would be possible to create a replicating cell from scratch. 60 years ago, the double helix of DNA was unknown.

the law seems to forbid human hybrids with other mammals. That leaves a huge area of potential nobel prize research for human hybrids with funguses, reptiles, invertebrates (bugs, jellyfish, worms) and plants, without even having to put out the call through seti for extraterrestrial volunteers.

What if the cure for cancer was found and based on a rat gene? (Rats are so cancer prone, I doubt it, but you never know.)What if an artificial womb was developed that can deal with extreme medical emergencies? (Mother dying of car crash and baby/embryo way too premature, or mother infected with horrible disease, or going to die of cancer without treatment that would abort the pregnancy, etc) (ie, not convenient party slut excuse)Just because some stupid politician got freak out by a distillation of "The Is

A traveling salesman was driving along a country road.As he passed a sheep farm he saw a man out in the field with his trousers down having sex with one of the sheep.Shocked, he pulled into the farm driveway, walked up to the farmhouse and knocked on the door.A beautiful young woman answered the and asked if she could help him.The salesman told the young lady "I don't mean to shock you, but there is a man out in your field doing inappropriate things to your sheep!"The young lady sighed, rolled her very large brown eyes and said;"Oh, that's just D-a-a-a-a-a-a-ddy.":)

Care to cite any source where a human and animal were artificially spliced that created such an occurrence? Unless there is a specific use case or real risk then this remains fiction and a waste of taxpayer dollars. There is a difference between reaonable legislation (say for instance, safety laws where a 'real' risk exists) and paranoia.